Sapere Aude
Tag: uber
capacity utilization rate is 30% higher for UberX drivers than taxi drivers when measured by time, and 50% higher when measured by km
uber isn’t just much much nicer for consumers, it’s also superior for congestion / the environment. no wonder they’re being fought so hard.
UberSeize is truly disruptive.
the best of all the uber handwringing recently. if you don’t know paul ford, may i present Google takes all
who knew “disruption” wasn’t invented in sv????
The mid-1910s saw an explosion of people driving unlicensed cabs. They were called jitneys (slang for a nickel, which was also what they typically cost) and cities across the US scrambled to regulate them.
Today, cities around the world are struggling to regulate modern-day jitney coordination companies—ride-sharing apps like Uber and Lyft. But unlike the ragtag cabs of a century ago, the modern day jitney company is well-financed, and plans on throwing plenty of money around to make sure it’s not regulated out of existence.
dumb, and creating an opening for various taxi commissions to justify bans.
Uber is arming teams of independent contractors with burner phones and credit cards as part of its sophisticated effort to undermine Lyft and other competitors.
Just as Hernando de Soto estimated there is over $9T in dead capital globally, a non-trivial amount of the $1Ts in Americans’ non-financial household net worth is undoubtedly dead—not because of informal titles, uncertainty of ownership, or dysfunctional financial institutions, but because the owners of this capital didn’t really see what they have as capital. And even if they did, markets were too riddled with information asymmetries, barriers to entry, and high transaction costs for this capital to be commercialized.
What we are seeing now is likely the tip of the iceberg; who knows what other capital lies dormant and how entrepreneurs may find ways to use it.
Taxi protest in Paris turns to guerrilla warfare as Uber car attacked on freeway
totally predictable, and makes you wonder whether entering france is just a huge PR move to generate disgust with the incumbents.
taxi commissions are one of the greatest evils in transportation.
In 1984, the Federal Trade Commission released a report that explained why taxis could charge customers exorbitant prices for dismal service. The simple reason: lack of competition in the market. The culprit: local governments. City agencies that regulate cabs, generally called taxi commissions, were deliberately protecting from competition the very companies they were supposed to police.
Gregor J. Rothfuss 